This piece is more an effort to lower my
blood pressure than anything else. (Apologies for typos)
The Maya Khan brigade appears to have
gone on a rampage in, wait for it....a park!
Telling your parents that you are going
to the “park” is never going to be the same ever again.
If you still haven’t seen the show
then a clip below kind of sums up the gutter television that SAMAA is
producing.
Now the last time I checked (and I
didnt realise that I needed to check this to begin with), two people,
of the opposite sex, sitting in a park, in broad day light, is not
illegal.
Some people who support this campaign
against “date's” point out that while they“offending” couples
may not be meeting illegally, the fact that they are together is
definitely immoral and against Islam!
Even assuming that a man and a women
sitting together is indeed “immoral”, who is SAMAA TV, Maya Khan
and the chattering aunties to go and hound them in a public space?
Going through the horrid clip above,
you see two dozen women running through a park, shouting “wo hijab
waali”, “dekho uss nai hijab pehna huwa hai”, escorted by men
with name tags and uniformed men, obviously employed by one or the
other private security company. If you had this great “hoard” of
judgement come charging at you, anyone would feel intimidated,
harassed and threatened. The last time I checked, and I may be
completely ignorant about this, when I go to a public space, that is
not what I expect, nor is such behaviour condoned by any legal
authority.
What perhaps magnifies the absurdity of
the behaviour of the women involved is their comments and reactions.
At the end of the clip, all the laughing, high fives and self
congratulation is disgusting! It appears as if they are on a human
Safari, corralling all those that they can look down upon into the
corner and shoving a camera in their face! As if passing judgement is not enough, the women indulge in a race to the bottom as each tries to out do the other, by offering further justification to explain why they are racing through a public space, harassing people!
While the hating aunties share there
views on what a mangni constitutes, even offering some legal
jargon to make themselves sound learned, and where you should and
should not meet your f fiancée, the smugness and self righteousness
increases more than proportionately as each minute passes.
Then comes the flip side of the
argument. That a “free media” can do what it wants and any
criticism of it is an attempt to curtail its freedom. No...the moment
the supposed “free media” uses bystanders to push up their
ratings, they are desperately calling for regulation to mediate their
output. By infringing on the rights and privacy of others, the media,
or any individual for that matter cannot claim freedom of expression
as a right, as they trample those of others.
Given that the right to privacy is a
basic human right and Pakistan is a signatory to the various
conventions, the blatant, recorded illegality of the actions of SAMAA
TV is just calling on someone to take action.
But this is perhaps the most
frustrating and cynical part of this whole episode. Maya Khan and her
crew pick on individuals who they know are vulnerable, who would not
want the spotlight or a media trial. Maya Khan and SAMAA have no
right to demand nikkahnama's from anyone and no one has to
explain their relationship to them.
In writing this post, I am probably
participating in the promotion of this video and the “efforts” of
Maya Khan and her ragtag bunch. However, if nothing else, this
episode is a clear example of how the race for ratings and fame has
made our media personalities increasingly desperate.
We can boycott and refuse to partake,
but sadly, there remains a large audience of people who will support
such programming.
If you are not one of them, then please
sign the following petition:
http://www.change.org/petitions/to-mr-zafar-siddiqi-ceo-samaa-tv-stop-subah-saverey-maya-kay-sath-vigilantism-like-lal-masjid
Write into SAMAA TV:
And lodge a complaint with PEMRA
The most effective way to lobby these
channels on their programming, is to write to those companies that
advertise and sponsor their shows.
Finally, some argue that what Maya
Khan and her brigade were upto was a good thing. They were helping to
get rid of immoral activity. If we accept that argument, then we
would have to accept the arguments of the Lal Masjid Brigade who
would have rounded up all the women running through the park, beat
them with sticks and demanded that they confine themselves behind
closed doors. I hate to say this, but in this case, perhaps in the
greatest interest, that would not be such a bad thing.
Actually, that would be a bad thing. No individuals rights should be curtailed for the greater good. Hear that SAMAA TV and Maya Khan? Or do you prefer playing the bully that everyone hates in the park?
Now just to cool things down and bring a smile at the end of this post, have a look at the original Hating Aunties:
